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What *would* be interesting is if a baseball video game came out that allowed you to change the rules around in ways like those proposed in the article and this thread.

Like, a game of MLB: The Show, where you can change the rules so that it's 19th Century baseball - but with modern players. Or Town Ball, with no foul territory, balls or strikes, and you can "soak" the players to retire them.

1. There is no batting order. The offense can send up anyone to bat at any time, provided
(a) the player is not currently on base, and
(b) the player has not already been put out in this inning, and
(c) the player is not substituting for another player during a plate appearance in progress.

2. The inning ends when nine players have been put out.

3. Other than in the top of the first inning, the defense will consist of the nine players who were put out in the team's most recent turn on offense.

4. There are no substitutions on defense during an inning; the nine players who started the inning on defense will complete the inning. If a player is injured and cannot finish the inning, the team can play defense shorthanded, with the remaining players who started the inning.

5. There are no pinch-runners. A runner must remain on base until he is put out, he scores a run, or the inning ends. If he scores a run, he is eligible to bat again, at any time.

6. The game concludes immediately if a team scores ten runs in one inning. If that does not occur, the game concludes if one team leads after the third inning. Additional innings will be played as needed, with one fewer player per inning, until one team leads at the conclusion of the inning. In the fourth inning, the defense has eight players, and must get eight outs. In the fifth, the defense has seven players and must get seven outs. And so on. For the ninth and subsequent innings, the defense will have three players and must get three outs.

If MLB were to radically alter the structure of the games, given their history I suspect what they'd do is add 3 innings to the game, thereby allowing it to be divided into four "Quarters," and so players don't get too tired let's add an extended break after the 6th inning for "Halftime." Offensive and defensive specialists can be interchanged freely, and the defense can line up in any position in fair territory as long as they don't exceed their 11 allowed players. Play will be stopped for TV commercials with one out in the bottom of every 3rd inning for the Two-Out Warning.

In 1974 a Baltimore Sun contributor (using a pseudonym; the article was reprinted in "The Great American Sports Book") suggested that baseball switch from nine three-out innings to three nine-out innings. Actually made a certain amount of sense.

Still nine innings, and still 27 outs. But the outs per inning will change a bit.

In one inning, you get one out.
In another inning, you get two outs.
In another inning, you get four outs.
And in yet another inning, you get five outs.
The other five innings are the normal three outs.

I haven't decided whether I prefer if managers must declare when to use their longer/shorter innings at the pre-game meeting, or if they can decide on the fly.

If you thought the Subway Series, which gets underway again in this town on Monday — couldn't be matched for baseball entertainment then you don't know about the "Tri-Cornered Baseball Game" that was played June 26, 1944, at the famed Polo Grounds.

The Giants, Dodgers and Yankees came together that day for an exhibition to raise money for the war effort. The results were unprecedented in so many ways. There were to be three ceremonial first pitches by Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia (though a sore arm limited him to one). The event raised $5.5 million in war bond purchases. And the final score was Dodgers 5, Yankees 1, Giants 0.

"We got a great crowd," recalled Dodgers pitcher Ralph Branca. "For the players in the game, what was happening was very strange: three teams playing in one nine-inning game. But you couldn't beat the cause. In New York, the newspapers were writing all about it."

In the Daily News, Dick Young called it "the wackiest diamond battle ever conceived" and described the crowd as "amused and confused."

"Each team was playing the field for six innings, three against each opponent. Each team was at-bat for three innings, against each opponent," said Dr. Michael Huber, Professor of Mathematics at Muhlenberg College, who is writing an academic paper about the event. "This was like nothing the New York fans had ever seen."